This episode originally aired on July 14, 2026.
A Short North business owner wrote an open letter, published in Columbus Underground, to the city council.
On behalf of business owners and residents, the letter's author would like to see Columbus leaders take action to help people living on the streets.
According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Development, Columbus saw a 3% increase in the number of people experiencing homelessness in 2025.
We’re looking at the current state of the unhoused in Columbus on this hour of All Sides.
Guests:
- Robin Davis, executive director, Safer Downtown
- Betsy Pandora, president and CEO, Short North Alliance
- Shannon Isom, president and CEO, Community Shelter Board
- Hannah Jones, deputy director of community development, City of Columbus' Department of Development
Transcript
This transcript is generated with AI. To ensure its accuracy, review the audio file.
Amy Juravich: Welcome to All Sides with Amy Juravich. The website, Columbus Underground, recently published a letter to the editor addressing Columbus City Council. Written by Jason Williams, owner of Big Fun Columbus, a vintage toy and collectible store in the short north, the letter calls on our city leaders to take action to help people living on the streets, especially those dealing with mental illness. And while they don't want to view every unhoused person in the same manner, Jason Henry, is the president of Friends of Goodale Park and a resident of Victorian Village, says there's a particular segment of the homeless population raising concern.
Jason Henry: My concern is more the chronically homeless folks that have been approached multiple times and offered support services that, for whatever reasons, don't accept and then are living in the park, the neighborhood, high street, and it, you know, creates a lot of problems, you know. From a strictly park standpoint. Myself and another board member are routinely cleaning up encampments.
Juravich: In an interview with All Sides producer Marcus Charleston, Jason Henry also said that this is a complicated issue to address and people are not without compassion.
Henry: I have tremendous compassion for these folks. And there's a myriad of reasons why they can't accept help. A lot of them are mentally ill, drug-addicted, alcoholics. You can't go into shelters with a partner or a pet. There's, like I said, a myriade of reasons why they don't accept health. And I don't pretend to be an expert on that, but I do understand it. But that leaves a situation where now you're in the park and from a compassion standpoint, it has to go both ways. I certainly have compassion for these folks and I want them to have a better existence because I just don't think it's very compassionate to have these folks walking around, eating out of the trash, yelling at clouds, getting into altercations. It's just not a good way to live.
Juravich: This hour we're looking at homelessness in Columbus and what's being done to help. And we're beginning our conversation by looking at how organizations are working with the city, merchants, and residents to help unhoused citizens. We'll begin our conversation with Robin Davis, Executive Director of Safer Downtown. Welcome to All Sides, Robin.
Robin Davis: Thank you, Amy. It's nice to be here.
Juravich: And also joining us is Betsy Pandora, president and CEO of the Short North Alliance. Welcome, Betsy. Thank you so much, Amy. So, Robin, let's start with you. Have business owners or residents in downtown, and then Betsy can speak for the Short North. Express concerns similar to what you just heard those soundbites.
Davis: Absolutely. Safer Downtown, we are a nonprofit organization. Our mission is pretty clear. We want to create and maintain a safe, clean, and welcoming downtown. And that is what we do through a number of efforts, including homeless outreach. Our ambassadors, our safety ambassadors, will make contact with them initially. And then we have four full-time contracted workers from Mount Carmel who will work on some of the things that you heard Jason Williams talking about. Getting them into, if not shelter, into perhaps treatment for medical mental addiction problems that they might have, and helping them get over the barriers to get into some kind of housing, whether that's shelter, permanent supportive housing, or whether they can get into low-income housing.
Juravich: And we have two different Jasons. So Jason Williams owns Big Fun Columbus, and he wrote the letter to the editor that kind of like spurred the conversation for today's show. But then Jason Henry is the friends of Goodale Park. So Betsy, I'm sure you're familiar with him. I know and love all the Jasons! There's many Jasons, okay. So, but the concerns expressed in the sound bite you heard with, and Jason there is specifically talking about Goodale park. Have you heard that from more than just the two Jasons?
Betsy Pandora: We certainly have and I think the context behind why concerns like this are as prevalent as we're seeing them be now really is rooted in how unsheltered homelessness has grown so significantly in Franklin County. We've seen a 43% increase year over year in unsheltered homelessness across the And when you see big jumps like that, the visibility of homelessness... And the day-to-day interactions with people who are experiencing those circumstances, those increase too. So we're certainly seeing that, and we work collaboratively across the community to figure out what are the right resources and the right interventions and the rights roles that we can all play in helping to support people through those moments, in addition to supporting the people themselves that are finding homelessness as their circumstance.
Juravich: Yeah, and in the letter to the editor, Jason Williams was saying that sometimes, you know, the police will come pick them up, sometimes they get arrested, and then they just end up back there, you now, a few days or a few months later, or they return even sometimes years later. Have you seen this instance where it's reoccurring, where the same people are getting called, you, know, it's like residents or business owners are calling for help with the same people.
Pandora: Yeah, what I think we see more than anything is that there is complexity and a uniqueness to every individual's circumstance of homelessness. And so, you know, one call truly may not result in a long-term solution for one individual. All. But those calls, the sum total of those calls is fundamental to being able to right-size systems and interventions so that we can truly be helping people through circumstances. In the short north, for example, and I can't speak exactly to maybe Robin's numbers. In the Short North, we have, like Jason Henry in his interview described, about 30 people who are chronically unhoused, meaning they have been without housing for more than 12 months. And the longer that you go without being a part of the safety network, the harder it is to actually navigate through that network. And Shannon, Isam, who I think is joining us soon, will talk a little bit about what this journey is like, where you then start to see commingled crises be a part of your story, where mental health challenge, where maybe addiction challenge also then becomes a factor. And so, The intensity of what it takes to be able to support any one person through that circumstance may increase the longer with which they are without housing. So ensuring that we are addressing the system and creating more units of housing and creating more shelter beds and fundamentally linking all of the service network to that system. Is what is critical to be able to move the needle on addressing the one individual that may be chronically encountered by some of the folks that you've heard accounts from in our community.
Juravich: This is All Sides on 89.7 NPR News. We're talking about how organizations are working with merchants and residents to address unhoused citizens. We're taking with Betsy Pandora, President and CEO of the Short North Alliance. Also with us is Robin Davis, Executive Director of Safer Downtown. So Robin, your group is called Safer downtown. Do unhoused people make downtown less safe?
Davis: I think there's certainly a perception of that. And in some cases, yes. There are some, especially with medical conditions, mental conditions that may become aggressive. Betsy talked about it very well. There's multiple stages, multiple things you can do. Calling the police is kind of the last option, but it is a good option when there is, it's the right option for when someone is aggressively panhandling, when maybe they won't leave an establishment. Or when they're walking into the street or things like that. Our safer downtown ambassadors can also help with that. I know that those who own restaurants or hotels, often they're not equipped to handle something like that, our ambassadors are. They are trained very well in de-escalation tactics, so they can get people to leave the establishment. Again, they're offering services, not unlike the people you heard. The services are offered and often declined, but at least it gets them to move on. And then we have that contact information and our homeless outreach folks can reach out to them, work to build relationships with them, which is one of the things that's very key. Betsy's exactly right. Every situation is different. Every person is experiencing something differently and we don't have a cookie cutter solution to all of it.
Juravich: The store owner, Jason Williams, wrote that he mentioned in his letter that he calls his CID ambassador to help with mentally ill people encounters in the short north. And then he says, if it's really bad, the ambassador or he will call the police. But what is he talking about when he says a CID embass-
Pandora: So the Short North Alliance provides support and services to our business community, mostly organized along High Street. We use the mechanism of what's called a SID or the Special Improvement District as a funding source. And so shorthand for referring to our team sometimes in the community is to refer to them as the SID.
Juravich: So you have ambassadors and you have other ambassadors, okay, yeah, and we've increased our
Pandora: a pool of ambassadors in the short north, not just because we've heard concerns like the ones that you're sharing right now, but because in general, the population of Columbus has grown, visitorship in the Short North has grown. We had over 12 million visitors last year to the Short north, and the need for hands to help support myriad of issues has become so much more prominent. So we're really pleased that we now have a team of ambassadors in the community who is not only on duty. All of the hours with which our businesses operate, which includes clear up until three o'clock in the morning. But we now also have a dedicated outreach ambassador whose job 40 hours a week is to focus on making engagements with individuals who might be experiencing a housing insecurity challenge, who might experiencing a mental health crisis, or who might experience an addiction crisis. And since that one staff position has been filled for us this year, since March. We've seen seven individuals moved into supportive housing services just through those direct interventions with that outreach ambassador. So now not just volunteers, you have a full-time employee doing it. Is what you mean? We've always had full- time people doing these roles, but we now have a whole time person performing the function of outreach support. OK.
Juravich: Robin, I don't think a visitor would know to call an ambassador, right? And so the resident might, I don't know how you communicate that if you like give out flyers so they know that these exist, but the resident, the business owner probably definitely does, but what about a visitor who has this encounter, they wouldn't know to call ambassador.
Davis: Well, we do have a hotline and let me do the plug for that. The hotline, and this is for the downtown area only, is 614-228-3788. So anything that you're seeing within the downtown area, anyone can call us. If you're not within the exact boundaries, we can refer it to someone else, if that's police or whatever. We do try very hard to make sure that visitors also know, hotels know to call, and they can give that information to our visitors. And we work closely with organizations like Experience Columbus. They let us know when someone's coming in. They're very aware of what our services are downtown, which is different than Short North, but pretty much just on paper. But Betsy and I talk frequently too. We both know what each other's doing.
Pandora: And we also have a hotline for these services as well, where we will dispatch to Robin's team through our team if it's within her bounds to support and vice versa, and our teams actually communicate with each other to share if there are common issues that all need to be aware of. This past spring, the Short North Alliance just opened the Short north safety office in the heart of the community. And this is meant to serve as a hub where we can connect. Police teams that are working in the community, our outreach teams, agencies like Southeast, who have a regular presence in the community along with our full ambassador team. And the hotline is very visible on the exterior walls of that office. We distribute magnets to all of the businesses that have the hot line number. And then there are digital kiosks throughout the community that every few seconds flash the hotline number for visitors. And then just yesterday we relaunched shortnorth.org. So we have an updated website that has lots of information, including the hotline number on every single page of the site, so that if people need support or assistance, whether that's to get a walking escort to their vehicle, to find parking, or to report a need for support and services and encountering an individual who's experiencing a crisis-based circumstance, they have that information far more clearly now.
Juravich: What about what we heard about encampments in Goodale Park? Is that an issue that you're having to deal with?
Pandora: You know, we see a lot of mobility among this population. And so what I would say is there's probably no one location that's a fixed, um, constant encampment within the community. But we do see, like, uh, like I shared a little bit ago, about 30 individuals who are chronically unhoused and present in the community who are sheltering on high street, sheltering, on private property, sheltering in park spaces. Is. And as we have seen homelessness across Franklin County grow, we've certainly seen those activities grow within our community.
Juravich: Robin, is there a particular place in the downtown where homelessness is a particular problem and your ambassadors are like, is there of a frequent place like Goodale Park?
Davis: There's not one exactly like that. There is often a camp that will come up behind the convention center, but both our special duty police officers, we work closely with police, and our ambassadors work hard so that those don't become permanent, semi-permanent, because the longer they are there, the more they're going to want to stay there. And it's really important to make sure that those doesn't become entrenched for exactly those reasons. But we don't have anything exactly like a good ale park that we see.
Juravich: Well, later in the hour, we're going to be talking to a member of the city's department of development about the need for more housing rates because these people have these encampments behind the convention center because maybe they don't have anywhere else to go. What do you do from your safer downtown perspective when they, because you mentioned earlier that people often decline help, what do you do?
Davis: The best we can do is continue to have our outreach, our homeless outreach people build that relationship with them. Often what you get in the denial is a lack of trust. They've had bad experiences before, especially with shelters for all the reasons that you mentioned that shelters you can't drink, you can smoke, you cannot go with a partner, or you can't go with a pet, those are barriers. But our homeless outreach people are looking to get beyond shelters. It takes a minute and they're working with those to overcome the boundaries they may be facing. Things like not having a birth certificate, not having place where their social security or disability checks might be sent. So they can work to overcome those problems and get them in line to get into permanent supportive housing or perhaps low income housing. But the one thing I will say, and this is exactly true, It's a six to eight month wait for any housing. That's a long time and the people then are still living on the street if they choose not to live in shelter during that time. But it's a longer process and then we often have people who will get off the list and then need to come back on and start all over. And that's a very difficult way to go.
Juravich: And just to end on, do you know of people from outside of the city, because I'm sure someone listening who lives in a suburb, they're not going to think downtown and the short north are separate, it's all downtown to them. Do you feel like people think that the short North and downtown are safe to visit? And how do you make it feel safer? Because if someone has one bad encounter, they might then therefore declare all of downtown not safe.
Pandora: Yeah, you know, we have continued as a community to come together and prioritize the Short North as a safe and welcoming community. And on the whole, it really is. And we have, our focus is making sure that we have the right resources to respond in any circumstance. And that doesn't require somebody to know to ask for the resource necessarily. What that requires is that We have eyes on the street. We have enhanced our services, and that we have the ability to intervene in issues if there are issues. But we continue to see really strong visitorship, really amazing new business openings, really inspiring legacy milestones for our existing business community. And it just continues to be, whether it's the short north or downtown, this vibrant heartbeat of our city.
Juravich: Yeah, and Robin, just in about a minute, how do you tell people, you know, downtown is safe?
Davis: We can tell them by police statistics. The police will tell you that it is one of the safest neighborhoods. Statistics will tell that it's the safest neighborhood, downtown is. We have a very low amount of crime, especially violent crime. But homelessness is something that we have to deal with and we deal with it every day. Our ambassadors are attacking that every day to try to get these people in a compassionate way into a more livable situation.
Juravich: We've been speaking with Robin Davis, Executive Director of Safer Downtown, and with Betsy Pandora, President and CEO of the Short North Alliance. Thank you both for joining us. Absolutely. Thank you. And coming up, we're gonna talk about the most recent point in time count of homelessness in Columbus and Franklin County. That's when All Sides continues on 89.7 NPR News.
Juravich: You're listening to All Sides. I'm your host, Amy Juravich.
We're talking today about the issue of homelessness in Columbus. The completion of the Point in Time Count in Columbus and around the state provides the most up-to-date information on homelessness in Ohio. And we're talking about what's being done in central Ohio and nationally to combat the issue. Joining us now is Shannon Isom, President and CEO of the Community Shelter Board, which brings together 16 agencies across Columbus and Franklin County to make sure everyone has a place to call home. Welcome back to All Sides, Shannon. I appreciate being here. Thank you for having me. So overall homelessness saw a small increase year over year, 1% from 2025 to 2026. But the number that was more startling was the unsheltered homelessness saw a 43% increase year over here. Tell me what that means, unsheltered homelessness.
Shannon Isom: The most basic definition of unsheltered homelessness are that those folks that we just don't find within any type of sheltered position of what's sanctioned shelter. And so that is any uninhabitable space, including what we see more anecdotally as just being outside. But unsheltered could also mean I'm in my car. It could mean that I have some level of shelter, but it's not a shelter that we deem habitable.
Juravich: So the number for Franklin County was, there were 455 unsheltered homeless in 2025, and it went up to 651 in 2026. Now, numbers on the radio are hard, but those numbers that I said, those are people. That's right. So what are some major takeaways that you have from this point in time count, and that number of people who don't have somewhere to go? Yeah.
Isom: Yeah, a couple of really major takeaways and we've talked about this a couple of times, Amy, so this hasn't really changed. The first takeaway is that we just don't have enough housing and I'm being very specific that the amount of housing, the level, the structure of housing that we need is for deeply affordable housing people need and any community needs to thrive diversity of housing and so that's the number one takeaway. The second takeaway is this was predicted. So when I came into this community in 2023, we were already under an assessment, a 20-month assessment to figure out, do we have a handle on this level, this trend of homelessness that is increasing? And if we don't, what should we be doing? And it was a tale of two cities, a mixed bag that, yeah, we are an optimal system for it, but it is underfunded and we need more housing. So it's also telling us that we are on the trajectory of 68%. Of unsheltered homelessness that we will see by 2028. It is telling us that that predictive modeling not only was accurate, but precise for this community. And then thirdly, that I'll be honest, looking at ourselves, we're losing the battle around homelessness overall and that there needs to be not only more housing, but a better investment.
Juravich: Well, we were just talking with a representative from the short north and a representative from downtown talking about the perceived, and I guess it's actual increased homelessness of people being on the streets. And they both mentioned people who are offered help, but decline the services. Can you talk to me about that? Like what happens there if the downtown ambassador is trying to help someone, trying to get them off the street and they decline the service? Yeah.
Isom: I'll answer that in two parts as well. The first is that I would say, the first indicator for that is that folks have been on the street too long. I would even say, I'd stretch it out and go a little bit before that and say that they've moved into a level of destabilization of housing that ultimately has failed at every level. And in that, once they move into the space where there's a, I don't want help, that what we have seen is a decline that's probably has taken. Some time and that we had opportunities to stop that and probably did not either have the right product or the right structure to do so. The second point that I will say is that it is easy for us to look at folks and say that folks are homeless, but I know that you have as well as I have here. We have studied this for a very long time and so what we really may be looking at is some other systems and structures that have failed, and so, what we are seeing and what is easy to denote is their homelessness. I will tell you, as I sit here, I'm always worried about as I raise the voice that we need more housing, and we do, that housing is not the only system and the only structure that we need to respond. We need to response to the human condition in all levels, and that means in our health care, within our mental health spaces, certainly within workforce and in education. We know that, and those things work together, but there's many people that are on the street within our communities that. Definitely have had destabilization of housing, but they've had destablization of other systems that have caused that homelessness. So if you're probably looking at someone who's saying, I'm done, I don't want your help, I would say that it is first, incumbent upon us to find a product to move through that. How do we move through the trust to ensure that I'm going to still be able to help you from where you stand and where you meet? And we must do that, so that's first. And then second, I would that when I'm talking about housing. I am also talking about all the structures of the systems that are connected to that. And so the systems must work. We have siloed ourselves in a lot of ways to saying that this is your lane and this is your line. Only I want you here. I've actually heard that message over and over again. You are community shelter board is right here. This issue that we're dealing with, this issue that is much more dimensional and textured than just housing has to have a more macro approach. I am hoping that as we're looking at people. On the street, that is the reflection of all the ways in which we have probably not responded to a very changing ecosystem and community in which we live today, that it will remind us to call for a different question.
Juravich: Yeah, so some of the people who may decline help may have mental illness that has gone untreated for too long, drug addiction, alcoholism. And so you're saying that those needed to be treated, like you can find them housing, you can put them into a temporary, even a hotel situation. But unless you address the drugs, the mental illness or the addiction, then it's not going to fix it. Is that what you mean?
Isom: Yeah, I think that what we have is multifactorial when we see people on the street, and I think it's easy for us to point to the one thing that we know we know, which is that they don't have housing. But I think under that, the root cause of that is that there's a lot of structures under that that have probably failed. So yes, we must address those things, but I say we can address them much more upstream. I also think, really, and Betsy, I know you just had her on here, we've talked about this. A community shelter board is in a position that we can be a little bit more strident in our voice about it is imperative that you must come off the street. It's imperative. It is not only imperative, we obligate you to come off this street. It is much harder when you're in uniform to have that message. It's much harder maybe even as an ambassador walks through the street, but I believe that community shelter boards and the folks that we work with, and certainly the nonprofits, have a more structured and strict way. To address some of those issues because those structures are intertwined in nonprofits and we fund them and we know how to meet people where they sit.
Juravich: So when a resident or a business owner in the short north, for example, has a problem with someone who's constantly, you know, sitting outside of their business, or there's, they're constantly having an encampment in Good Ale Park and they call their ambassador, or if it escalates, they call the police, are you saying, does the ambassador call the community shelter board to try to help?
Isom: Yeah, I think that we all, as a responder, can work together. I believe, though, we are at the point, and especially here within the central area of Franklin County, Columbus are probably at the point where we have to also think about what is the collective effort around civility and dignity and having regard for not only those that have businesses and certainly have put their savings into those business, but also our tourists and people that are living in there. But also to those that are moving through probably the worst part of their lives and we're seeing it. And I think with that, as I would be, as maybe if my kids were in that place, I would want some strictness around what health looks like. And I I think that we can, again, look for and ask for something different than what we've done in the past.
Juravich: I think we should be. This is All Sides on 89.7 NPR News. We're talking about the recent point in time count, which gave us some numbers of those who are unhoused in the area. And we're talking about what to do related to homelessness. We are talking with Shannon Isom, President and CEO of the Community Shelter Board. You appeared before Columbus City Council many times asking for more funding. You received $7.2 million in the most recent budget, I believe, if I have the right number. But how much are you receiving compared to what you received in the past? How much more do you need? I mean, you just mentioned, yeah, you mentioned that this unsheltered number is going to just increase. So you need more, yeah, tell me about the money.
Isom: The money, since I've been here, I can say gladly that we have received more money over each and every year. And I would say between the city administration, the mayor's office, and the Department of Development, as well as the city council, that 7.2 number is actually a little bit lower. We've received $13.8 million in this past year, and year over year, they have invested into the Community Shelter Board, its system, its nonprofit partners. They've done really well in listening and certainly leaning into what's needed. But more is needed. It's always needed because we have a growing economy and we need to get in front of it, not behind it in response, but in front it proactively. We are also really, really reliant on our county dollars as well. We're still waiting on those county dollars. In any given year, we need about $35.2 million. Some of that has passed through. Through HUD, $35.2 million to respond to homelessness, and we are up to about an $81 million organization because the majority of what we do is housing. We keep the dollars for HUD. We are, as I've noted before, number one and number two in how much dollars that we receive from HUD and how much that we spend on housing for the homeless system. And so. We will continue to need more until we hit that 35.2 magic number to sustain our dollars. But I do believe once we get there, not only believe it, I promise it that once we get to a sustained dollar amount from our public, from both city and county, that we can start changing the arc of what we see in our shelters and within the street and start investing more into housing, the type of housing that is hard for developers, private developers to develop. Housing that we need for those that are transitioning. So deeply affordable housing is what we'd like to see more of.
Juravich: What type of housing are you looking for? Like an example is the former YMCA building downtown is being converted into affordable housing, but then there's always that, you know, squishy definition of affordable, right? But are you talking about, do you need even more temporary places? Do you need hotels? Do you more shelter beds or you need everything?
Isom: Yes to everything except more shelter beds.
Juravich: Okay, you don't need. Okay.
Isom: Yeah, and I'm not going to say, you know, there's an argument for having more shelter beds. And I think that that argument is constructive. My worry in being responsible for the responsiveness of our system and the readiness of our system, if I have and add one more shelter bed, then I have a bigger shelter, which is very difficult to sustain. Our cost of a shelter bed has increased. We're at $24,000 a little over that per bed per year. And that's hard. To sustain for any community. And so what I do know that is a more sustainable investment is housing. You asked what type, all of it, but more specifically zero to 40% housing. What does that mean? That means that people that are making anywhere between 12 to $20,000, that type of housing. Do I need temporary housing? Yes. Transitional housing. We know that families that are moving through intimate partner violence actually do the best when they're in that temporary housing. Structure back up to a more permanent housing. I need rapid rehousing, I need more non-congregate areas that you are temporarily in, maybe for two years, 18 months, up to four years moving on to a permanent space. We need more stair steps in the affordable, deeply affordable housing space. When you talk about affordable housing that's being built, we really hear more of that 80 to 100 percent AMI. What does that mean? Those are people that are making about $51,000. And above. We need housing for those that are making under that.
Juravich: Or housing for those who are not able to hold down a job. So talk to me about someone who is dealing with addiction or alcoholism or mental illness, and they don't have a job and feel like they don't have anywhere to go, but then due to their mental illness they're declining services. Where do those people go besides the hospital?
Isom: I, we don't have any space for those folks either. Interestingly enough, the question is exactly what I've answered in the beginning. That needs to be done in conjunction with the healthcare system. That needs be done in conjunction with the experts around mental health. We are the experts around HUD, right? We are experts around homelessness. The shelter is a tapestry of all of those things, all of the systems that have failed people that go into there. But we're not the experts of mental health. We're not experts of those that are moving through intersectionality of drug addiction and mental health, we're that. And so what we're calling for as we are in this housing space and we are charged to be readied, we are calling in the healthcare system, the mental health system, the drug and alcohol addiction specialist, those system providers to use those dollars, those state dollars, those federal dollars. And say how do we make for spaces for people who are intersected with not only not having housing, but really intersected with some root issues around healthcare.
Juravich: So whose job is that to make the health care system better? Is that, I mean, does the city need to pour some money into it? Does the city to ask the hospitals and health care providers to do better? Like whose job?
Isom: I think that first the first job is that anyone can call the question as you just did whose job is it? I would say that I've you know, I've I've been in a medical medical school I went to school public health what I really think is that whose job it is Is that first for the collective effort of community to say what's going on? You've asked is there enough if there's is there Enough of us stepping up to respond to what we're seeing in our community and then who should come forward are those people that? Expertise in that. That's that's our doctors, our psychiatrists, our health care system, our administrators of health care systems. That is our mental health, all of it, from Adam H., which is, in a lot of ways, just like us, community shelter board, all the way to and through privates that are within this space and calling forward. I think that's our representatives, our state and our federal connectivity to those dollars that pour into this community around health care and mental health and drug and addiction. That's public health. Those are our entities that are saying, what are we doing within this space? And then holding, that's not only CSB from a SIL, those same dollars, state, federal, local dollars accountable, but likewise and reciprocal with mutual benefit, holding those other systems accountable. But there's no way that any one system can solve this this big big big issue, conglomeration of issues, conflation of issues that people are dealing with and walking around with. There's also workforce. I know now we're talking about workforce housing. I think that's a good way also to solve the issue. No one way to solve it is as linear. This isn't as linear, this is circular. But there needs to be more than one person at the table at a time. And I would say at the minimum four to five of us should be sitting here. I would actually also like to call you know, our education sector, not because they're accountable, but because they see it all and they could also school us on what we're missing.
Juravich: Well, just to end on overall, how would you say the city of Columbus is doing in terms of homelessness? Because you said that your funding has increased, but you mentioned a number where there's a gap and you need more. You're not blaming it all on the city, there's state, there's federal, but how is Columbus doing?
Isom: Yeah, I will tell you that I love this question because the Community Shelter Board always has by default centered on Columbus, but the Community shelter board is Franklin County. We have an HMIS system, a system that we report up to the federal government. We have HUD dollars that right now we're writing a grant for to ensure that $30 million comes into this community that doesn't cover just Columbus, it covers the entire Franklin County Groveport. To Reynoldsburg, to New Albany, all the way over to Hilliard, but asking specifically how Columbus is doing. The city of Columbus is a leader in this space. As we sit down and talk to other mayors that have homelessness and we're taking care of community members within every single solitary zip code of this county, I would say that the city of Columbia's, Mayor Genther, the city council, is leading in the investment within this space. And we're asking for everyone around the city and the townships to learn more and to invest and how do we make for a better Franklin County response because HUD expects it and we're really, really good at it.
Juravich: We've been speaking with Shannon Isom, President and CEO of the Community Shelter Board. Thanks for being here today. Oh, I appreciate it. Thank you. And coming up, we're gonna talk about how the city of Columbus is addressing homelessness. We're gonna about building some housing. That's when All Sides continues on 89.7 NPR News.
You're listening to All Sides. I'm your host, Amy Juravich.
We're talking about the issue of homelessness in Columbus this hour. Earlier in the program, we heard from Jason Henry, president of the Friends of Goodale Park and a resident of Victorian Village. And we're gonna hear from him again. In an interview with All Sites producer, Marcus Charleston, he talked about the segment of the homeless population refusing treatment. In this sound bite, he addresses the outlying issues that arise.
Henry: My thought is that if you allow that to occur, one becomes two, two becomes five, and then you've got a major problem where people are not able to enjoy the park. Beyond that, I mean, there's other peripheral issues. When I do clean up encampments, there's a bunch of packages from people's porches and things like that. So there's lot of damage done. There's been break-ins at the shelter house. There's been, the doors been kicked in, there's been campfires up on the porches to the point now where we're, you know, in partnership with Reckon Parks, we have lifted some of the branches on the Evergreens because those served as kind of camp sites for lack of a better word. And we're working to put some ornamental iron on the North porch of the caretakers house because it's just a constant. Residential area.
Juravich: And this is what Jason Henry had to say about working with the city to address concerns of residents and business owners.
Henry: I've had discussions with the Rec and Parks. And again, I've got great relationship with Rec and Parks, Columbus Police, you know, I had this discussion with a number of city people and city leadership. Um, and it's not, I mean, if it was an easy fix, it would have been done by now. So I'm not pretending like it's some, you know, there's some magic bullet here to, to take care of this thing. Um, but. You know, it's tough because you have to be compassionate to the residents as well. You know the residents, the business owners, the people that are just trying to enjoy the park.
Juravich: Here to talk about the City of Columbus addressing the issue of homelessness is Hannah Jones, Deputy Director of the City of Columbus's Department of Development. Welcome to All Sides, Hannah.
Hannah Jones: Thank you, Amy.
Juravich: So you just heard Jason talk about some of his concerns. He also expressed concerns earlier for mentally ill people living on the streets of Columbus. How does your department address the issue of homeless citizens who maybe decline treatment and just continue to, you know, not get help?
Jones: Sure, one of the initiatives that we have recently stood up is the Columbus Outreach and Resource Engagement Team, which we call CORE. And that's really engaging with Southeast and Mary Haven, which are two providers, as Executive Director Isom referenced earlier, that have significant experience in the mental health and behavioral health space, that can go out and really do a different type of outreach with these individuals. So much more relationship-based, trust-based. Time-intensive engagement with individuals to begin to better understand barriers, to engage with them regardless of where they may be in the city, to kind of build that trust in order to do more substantial barrier reduction in order to get them to a place where they are more willing and able to come inside and accept services.
Juravich: Well, Jason works for the Friends of Goodale Park and lives in Victorian Village. He mentioned in one of his earlier sound bites that there's many parks in many neighborhoods in Columbus. Is this a problem you're hearing about in other areas of the city for certain parks dealing with people maybe living in the park?
Jones: We have a lot of experience in parks throughout the city. I think Goodale is unique in that it is in the center of the city, in the Center of a very active space. But we do have a number of parks where individuals may be camping. And we work with Rexam Parks to engage regularly. Have either Mount Carmel, which is the outreach team that is engaged through CSB. Or our homelessness advocacy liaison go in, begin to engage with those campers, talk about the need to find alternative options, figure out if they're already engaged with our homeless system or what barriers therein may be. And then those individuals who may be on the land for longer amounts of time or meet other criteria could receive a referral to the core team for that more extensive engagement.
Juravich: Shannon Isom mentioned sometimes there's a six to eight month wait for a place in certain areas. It depends on each individual person of what they're needing and looking for. Is that something, is that why the core team was developed? Is it supposed to be a little quicker? There's a no wait.
Jones: It's it is to try to get to more people faster. So I think you know There are many parts of our city that don't have dedicated outreach workers One of the great things about the work that Betsy is doing in the short north and Robin is doing Downtown is that they have ambassadors and dedicated outreach that can spend time with folks So the Mount Carmel team is deployed citywide and countywide. And so the core team was really to layer on to that and to just bring more infrastructure to be able to get to more people quicker that may need a longer ramp up time. So it doesn't necessarily make it a quicker turnaround into housing, but it allows us to remove a lot of the barriers that then allow to transition them into the larger shelter system in a meaningful way without having to start all over again.
Juravich: That's interesting because, yes, the downtown area, the short north, they have these ambassadors. It seems like a pretty robust program, like multiple ambassadors, volunteers, and employees to help with this. But I'm guessing all areas of the city don't have that.
Jones: Yes, that is true that all areas of the city do not, however, the mayor has made efforts to spearhead the Clean and Safe Corridors initiative and we have been able to layer onto that in a number of ways and go out and support them. So we've done Sullivan Avenue previously, they did 161 Parsons Avenue last year. Worked with Southside Thrive to engage with individuals and we did coordinated you know, walking and talking for lack of a better word, just really trying to understand what people were experiencing, how we could help them, and get to know folks in a meaningful way that allows for a longer term engagement to find another option for them than to remain outside. And quite frankly, sometimes to understand if they are actually living on the land. I think there's a lot of people who we may make assumptions about, and it's really just understanding what's happening in their situation and how best to perhaps find another option for them. Mm hmm.
Juravich: And, you know, we heard those clips from Jason with friends of Goodell Park, and he said he's had many conversations with many different city apartments and wants to have compassion and wants a compassionate response for the homeless, but he wants a passionate response for the residents living there, the neighborhoods, the businesses. How do you balance that in making sure that the residents and the businesses understand how you're helping like if they keep seeing these the people then they feel like you're not helping. Yeah
Jones: Absolutely, I think the hardest part of it is that I don't know that there is a perfect balance. We are dealing with a national issue, you know, as Shannon said, like there are a number of systems and institutions that have failed a number of people in different ways. And so I think what we have to continue to do is hear the residents, explore new ideas, pivot and be responsive when we can, and also acknowledge that there are rights. And there are responsibilities that we have to the residents who are in crisis at the moment and do our best to build interventions on both sides of that. So, you know, as we hear from our residents who are frustrated with individuals who may be sleeping in the land or in parks, you know one of the conversations that we are having at a leadership level is how to better coordinate. How do we work with recs and parks better, with CPD and others to streamline communication, to perhaps... Think different about monitoring properties. Do we need to revisit how we maintain properties? All of that is part of the growing pains of our city and one that I don't think we can just flip a switch and we'll be perfect. So I think we have to listen, we have acknowledge that we might not always get it right but then continue to look at how to make it better. I think another area that the mayor has been really aggressive in is to lean in further upstream. So how do we be more proactive to keep people out of shelter, to your point with the wait lists and others, so that we aren't continuing to add undue pressure to take away even more of the limited resources for those who's most critical and the very low income housing options that are out there. So investment in rental assistance, investment in access to council, investment in housing stability crisis navigation, all ways that we can keep people stable. Or create an intervention that doesn't have them enter the shelter system unnecessarily.
Juravich: Unfortunately, we only have a minute left, but I'm going to ask you this anyway. Shannon said that there's a need for more very low-income housing, like making less than $40,000 a year, and that's what's missing. What can the city do? Because developers aren't going to build that. They're not going to make any money off it.
Jones: Absolutely. With the voter approved $500 million bond package, we have identified hopefully up to $125 million that is really looking at that foundational rung of the housing strategy that step up on the ladder. And I don't know that we have the answer. I think it's bringing together all of our partners to say this is the type of housing we need. We will have the funding to help support it. Who do we bring together to think about that way? And, you know, offer the operations and social services around it to make it successful.
Juravich: And so I the money is going to go for plans, but that's not enough money probably to build it all friend
Jones: So, well, it's a little bit of to be determined because we're still kind of identifying what the key rungs of that strategy will be, but it's probably a little of layering it. So it won't be the plans, it will be construction, of which planning will probably be a part of that. All right, that's what everyone wants to hear.
Juravich: To see the construction. We've been speaking with Hannah Jones, deputy director for the city of Columbus's Department of Development. Thanks for joining us, Hannah. Thank you, Amy. And you're listening to All Sides on 89.7 NPR News. I'm Amy Juravich.